From: Eliezer S. Yudkowsky (sentience@pobox.com)
Date: Tue Aug 03 1999 - 19:40:28 MDT
paul@i2.to wrote:
>
> For those following the IA vs. AI thread, consider the
> backlash now escalating against genetic engineering
> (bioenhanced food, cloning). And this hysterical backlash
> is happening despite the most ethical intentions and
> carefully crafted rhetoric of working biotechnologists.
It just occurred to me that I've been engaging in exactly the sort of
qualitative thinking I keep asking people to get away from. The
question is not the degree of backlash against AI, but the degree of
backlash compared against IA.
I'll bet that more people go after me with machine guns for being a
(natural!) neurohack than will ever object to my efforts in AI. After
all, an altered human is there, already existent, easy to see, easy to
conceptualize, easy to fear, and easy to hate.
I'd love to work on neurohacking but unfortunately I expect enough
public and governmental interference to make the point moot. Nobody's
going to let me experiment on 11-year-olds, which is where the most good
could be done. I doubt it'll even be possible to hack around with
adults except on some offshore hospital-boat. And I certainly can't run
the effort via PGP.
--
sentience@pobox.com Eliezer S. Yudkowsky
http://pobox.com/~sentience/tmol-faq/meaningoflife.html
Running on BeOS Typing in Dvorak Programming with Patterns
Voting for Libertarians Heading for Singularity There Is A Better Way
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